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A Mexican Fish Tale

Note: various versions of this story circulate out there. As a creative writing exercise, here is mine.

Once upon a time, a very long time ago, before the internet or cell phones, there was a very smart professor. He taught Economics at the Harvard Business School, which is to say that was where he was tenured, for as a world-renowned expert in the study of all things business, he only occasionally did any teaching. He had written many books, all well-received, and was sought out by industry titans and finance rain-makers for his views. A simple hour of his time providing advice could run to five digits, but everyone agreed it was well worth it.

The professor was not only at the top of his profession, he was at the top of his game. He embodied his theories on efficiency and return on investment, which made him quite wealthy and respected by his peers, if not quite such an interesting dinner date. Not that that observation bothered him, since time spent on such activities carried a heavy opportunity cost, broken relationships led to poor efficiency, and broken marriages? Well, he could cite a long litany of successful people who found a way to lose it all in divorce. Hardly a promising investment.

If any doubt about his life choices ever buzzed about his consciousness, he batted it away just as fast. At times, though, some doubts might creep in on a cold north wind blowing across Harvard Square. This was one of those times.

He hadn’t taken any time off, well, since ever. Time off was time lost, and while he could afford any luxury he could imagine, he was unwilling to pay the opportunity cost. Still that cold wind kept hounding him on his way to the office, and he let his mind linger just a bit longer on the idea of taking a short break. He knew the data on productivity gains associated with vacations; he also knew it was only a possibility, not even a probability. Perhaps he could conduct a little personal experiment to see how it applied to someone as efficient and productive as he was?

Safely inside his office and out of his overcoat, he asked his assistant–to her absolute amazement–to research where he could “take a little break from the cold.” The professor laid out a series of parameters, of course: nowhere too exotic, nothing more than a few hours flight, some place warm and quiet and absolutely NOT a tourist destination.

A short while later she returned, with this initial bid: “How about Mexico?”

His dismissal was abrupt and total: “No. What part of NOT-A-TOURIST-TRAP did you fail to get?”

She persisted, “I’m not talking the beach locations. There is a large lake in central Mexico that meets all your requirements: warm, quiet, not touristy, only a few hours flight time.” She passed him printed material about some place called Lake Chapala.

He demurred, if only for the moment. ‘I trained her,’ he thought, and she was good at her job. Perhaps he should give it due consideration. “Thanks, I’ll consider it” was all he said.

And so he did. The more he looked into it, the more he became convinced. It would not be very expensive and his assistant could do all the necessary rescheduling. With his characteristic decisiveness, he set the plans into motion, and only a week later he was on a flight to Guadalajara. The second thoughts arose as the plane left the runway.

The week back was going to be overloaded, he worried, and would be a real test of his improved efficiency. Would he really be able to keep away from work, or at least from thinking about work? What if the weather was bad, or the food not to his liking? So much was riding on this in his mind.

It didn’t get better as he debarked the plane into the queues for immigration, luggage, and customs: ‘Is there no word for efficiency in Spanish?’ he thought. He was passable enough in the language to hold a conversation, which was another plus to the location, but the question was rhetorical. When he emerged from the secure arrivals area of the airport into the throngs offering everything from taxi rides to trinkets to porterage, he seriously considered turning right around. But he stayed the course, even for an hour-long taxi ride that seemed more like time travel to the 18th century.

Once he settled in to the room at the boutique hotel in Ajijic, he had an odd feeling, one he hadn’t felt in a very long time: relaxation. He opened the curtains and looked out at the peaceful lake, the mountains, the bright blue sky. ‘Yes,’ he thought, ‘this will work . . . or maybe not-work is the right phrase’ he chuckled to himself.

The next morning he had decided upon a routine: breakfast, delivered to his room, eaten on the veranda, overlooking the lake. Followed by some light reading–nothing work related–until lunch. A short walk around the village and a stop for lunch, back to the room for some crosswords and more reading, perhaps a siesta, then late dinner once again in the village. Delightfully boring. He smiled at the notion he was even packing resting-time into his vacation: efficient as always.

As he sat reading that morning, he noticed a local fisherman wandering out to his boat around ten o’clock. When the professor got back from lunch, the fisherman was pulling his boat back to shore and leaving with a small catch. “Bankers hours for fishermen?” he mused.

The next day the cycle repeated itself, but this time the professor noted the fisherman returned again in the late afternoon and fished into the early evening, with the same meager results. “Twice the travel time for no extra performance,” he began, but pulled himself up short–no business here on vacation!

As the week wore on, the professor became more and more engrossed in the fisherman’s activities: how he stored the boat and nets, where he fished, the size of his catch, the hours spent on the water versus the hours preparing and traveling. The professor passed it off as not-business-related, just an interest in all things local. Toward the end of his vacation, the professor couldn’t contain himself any longer. He saw the fisherman pulling in to shore around two in the afternoon, and he called him over.

“Buenas tardes, señor” he began, “may I ask you a question?”

“Of course” the fisherman replied.

“I have been here all week, and I noticed your coming and going. Why do you start so late in the morning?”

“I stay home for breakfast and see my grandkids off to school.”

“Well, where do you go in the afternoon?”

“School lets out, and I see my grown children, too, then I take care of some tasks from my wife, maybe take a siesta. Finally I come back and finish fishing until dinner.”

“If you came earlier in the morning, packed a lunch, and fished straight through the day, you would catch many more fish. You spend so much time coming and going, loading and unloading.”

“I think you are right. But why catch more fish?”

“You could sell them and buy better nets, or another boat.”

“I see. And then catch even more fish?”

“Exactly!”

The fisherman looked down at his huichol sandals, then over at his boat, pondering his next comment carefully. “Muchas gracias, señor, you have a good idea. I will think about it some more. Adios.” and with that he trundled off.

The next day, the professor kept looking out at the lake in the early morning, to see if the fishermen had arrived. Around ten, the fisherman pulled his boat out onto the lake, then fished until two and came back in, as always. ‘Bad habits are the hardest to break’ the professor thought.

This time, though, the fisherman came walking straight back to where the professor was sitting. “Señor,” he started, “I have been considering what you said, and I have a question.”

“Go ahead, por favor.”

“After I get the boats and nets and catch more fish. Then what?”

“Then you hire people to fish for you on your boats. Maybe set up a small store and sell the fish yourself. Eventually you put in a restaurant, maybe a delivery service. Branch out into charter fishing trips. Who knows? Soon you’ll be el rey del lago (King of the Lake). I am a professor, I provide advice like this at the university. I guarantee that you will make a ton of money and then you can retire.”

“And?”

The professor laughed. “Well, then, I guess we all die. We have a saying up north, ‘there are two things in life that can’t be avoided: death and taxes.'”

Now it was the fisherman’s turn to laugh. “Oh, señor, I am a Mexican. We know that taxes can always be avoided! But death? Who would want to avoid that? Death is like an old friend you only get to see one more time. Here in Mexico, we don’t fear death, and we certainly don’t avoid it . . . look at how we drive! Do you know about our Day of the Dead?”

Visions of skeletons and macabre parades danced across the professor’s mind: strange, semi-pagan rituals fueled by too much tequila, no doubt. “Yes, Dia de Muertos isn’t it?” he replied.

“Yes. One time you must visit here for this fiesta. You will learn something from it!” Then the fisherman turned and shuffled home.

‘That will be the day’ the professor mused.

The next morning was his last before flying home. The professor assumed his position by the shore, and just before ten o’clock, the fisherman appeared and walked straight toward him.

“Buenas dias, señor,” he began

“Buenas dias, amigo,” the professor responded, “have you thought about my advice.”

The fisherman said, “I have thought of nothing else!” which caused the professor to smile a little.

“And?”

“Of course your are right, señor, we both know that. It will all come out exactly as you say.”

“But . . . ?” the professor interjected, sensing the rejection in the fisherman’s voice.

“It was very kind of you to offer this great advice. But I am too busy living to do all that work. I hope you can understand that. I hope you will think about that” he added, emphasizing the word.

“Yes, yes, of course” the professor replied with a resigned-but-friendly tone. “good luck!”

“Que te vaya bien, señor” the fisherman said, and headed to his boat.

Soon the professor was back aboard a plane, tanned, rested, and ready, as it were. His assistant had faxed down some preparatory material, and he devoured it. He was energized like he hadn’t been in years, and the exhilaration continued when he got back to Boston. He hired a second assistant, and wore both out as he endlessly rattled off memos, notes, to-do’s and the like. His productivity spiked, and the increase lasted months, not weeks. Even his colleagues noted how happy he seemed, on top of how productive.

As the Fall loomed in New England, he decided to take another break. There was no sense waiting until the depths of Winter; he would go in early November and beat the rush, then work through the holidays when everyone else wanted time off! So once again he was off on a flight to Guadalajara, but this time he was relaxed before he arrived: nothing to worry about, and he knew how much more productive he would be after the break.

When he emerged the first morning to eat breakfast on the veranda, he noticed the same fishing boat he had seen last year. This time, though, the fisherman did not arrive at ten and still had not arrived when the professor decided to walk into town before lunch. As the professor walked the village’s cobblestone streets, he noticed fewer crowds in the storefronts. He did see families walking in the distance, all heading in the same general direction, and he could hear far-off banda music. He wondered what was going on, so he walked toward the music.

The crowds thickened and led to the panteon, the cemetery. He glanced at his watch: of course, November 1st, Dia de Muertos. ‘I guess the old fisherman got his wish’ he thought. Having come this far, he joined the queue and wandered through the cemetery gate and into a spectacular scene.

Families were gathered around graves, sharing a meal and tending to the sites. A Mariachi band played in the distance. He noticed the small altars, ofrendas, with pictures and candles and mementos, the children playing, people telling stories. The air was clearly festive, and as he walked about, his mind wandered back to his parents and grandparents, his childhood, the funerals he attended. How different this was!

“Señor” a woman’s voice intoned, “may we help you?”

The professor snapped back to reality and realized he had wandered to the foot of a grave-site, smack in the middle of a family gathering!

“Lo siento” he intoned, “I wasn’t paying attention. I was look–” he stopped mid-sentence, as he gazed at the altar in front of the tombstone. On it was a picture of a fisherman and a boat. Not just any fisherman, but the same man he had spoken to just a year earlier. “–ing, err noticing—” his voice trailed off.

His mind raced. Was that the fisherman? He was used to speaking in front of large audiences, used to being the very picture of self control, unperturbed. Yet he felt himself standing there, speechless, and realized his mouth was still open though no words were emerging.

“Esta bien, señor” the woman said soothingly, noting the man’s apparent shock: “did you know my Francisco?”

The professor still had not regained his composure: “Yes, errrr, no, I mean not well. We met last year when I was here on vacation. We talked about work and things . . . ” again his voice trailed off.

“Of course, señor. You must be the professor! He told us all about you.” the woman said.

“He did?” A fleeting sense of pride helped the professor briefly recover his bearings.

“Yes, he told us he met a professor–a very intelligent man–who had excellent ideas about how to grow a business. He said he was sad to tell you he could not follow your advice, but that you would understand one day.”

Listening to the woman’s matter-of-fact voice, he felt his normal confidence returning. “well, then, thank you for sharing that. I am sorry for your loss, but I must be going. Sorry to intrude!” he said, hoping to make good his escape and complete his recomposure.

“No, not at all,” she replied, “after all, we were expecting you, in way.” She passed the professor a plate with some tacos.

Panic edged back into the corners of his consciousness, but a lifetime of cynicism held it in check: “Expecting me? Seriously? And how is that?” he said with a little bit of edge, as he took the plate.

“Francisco was sick in bed for several weeks before he died. One time, he reminded me about his meeting you. He said he gave you some advice, and you promised to consider it. He told me you were very educated, so someday you would figure it out, and you would come back here.” She poured some tequila into a small glass and handed it to him.

The professor gulped the tequila and repeated aloud “He gave me some advice” as the vertigo threatened to return. ‘I gave him advice, and he rejected it. What advice did he give me?’ he thought. He mentally rewound the tape of their encounters, and there it was. He suddenly felt a sense of peace, not just relaxation, but a more wholesome sense of accomplishment, something like completing a difficult crossword puzzle.

The fisherman’s wife refilled the professor’s tequila. The look on his face had completely changed, although he had uttered not a word. “Yes, yes he did. And he was right, I did figure it out, thanks to him. To Francisco!” he said and drained the tequila in a toast.

“Now I really must be going.” the professor said as he handed back his plate and glass.

“To work?” the woman asked?

“No, I’m too busy living to do all that work” he replied.

Mexican Expat Myths #5: You don’t need to learn Spanish

This little gem gets trotted out lakeside from time-to-time. Someone will ask on social media “do I have to learn Spanish before I retire to Lake Chapala” or “can I get by with buenas this-and-that?” A few starchy old male expats in t-shirts sitting on the terraza harrumph back with why one must speak Spanish or why it’s only polite or just “stay out of my country” (that last one is always a little confusing).

It is absolutely true that lakeside, like the tourist havens, has plenty of English-speaking local residents. And plenty of bilingual expats to help out. The tourist sites actually prefer you speak English, because they have gone to the trouble of hiring bilingual staff and the one thing they want is a great customer experience (and review), not one that recalls the time your high school Spanish failed you and the mesera almost slapped you when you asked her if she was embarazada after spilling your drink (look it up, if you must).

Lakeside has many English-language amenities: churches and newspapers and clubs and the Lake Chapala Society and restaurants and drivers and tour companies and body shops and a special mercado and lawyers and real estate agents and bars and nightclubs and delivery services and all of them cater to English-speaking (only) expats. So it’s easy to believe you’re in some part of borderland Texas, or California, or even Florida where you don’t really need to speak Spanish.

But it is limiting. You see, the English-speaking veneer at lakeside is just that: a thin covering. Drive a few miles outside it, and try your “can you understand me if I shout?” bilingualism and you’ll get smiles and stares. People will try to help you, if they can figure out what you want. And that’s ok. But if you wander into a real Mexican restaurant, they may not understand your pantomime for less-spicy salsa. If you go driving around the many cultural or historical sites of Mexico, you might not understand whether the attraction is closed for an hour or for the day. Your legal documents are in Spanish with an ingles translation, and only the español is authoritative. If the police stop you, or you need an ambulance away from home, well, you get the point. You can travel (with a guide). You can go shopping (with a bilingual friend). You can attend the government bureaucracy (with a fixer). But you’re limited by what you don’t know: Spanish.

Which is not to say there aren’t a sizable number of expats who know a few Spanish words (the polite ones) or none at all and they still enjoy the expat life lakeside. It limits your travel areas, your circle of friends, your lifestyle. But there is still plenty to experience here.

Final judgment: You don’t need to learn Spanish: this is a tough one. How best to nuance it? You don’t need to be polite, either, but wouldn’t you rather be?

Mexican Expat Myths #4: Mexicans never say no

Expat version of a Dad joke:

Expat (to Mexican amigo): “Do Mexicans ever say ‘no’?”

Mexican amigo: “¡No!”

Sorry for that, but it had to be said.

It’s a common observation among expats that Mexicans don’t like to say a flat “no.” They consider it a bit rude, and it leads to cultural friction with gringos who are more accustomed to direct language. It all goes back to the importance of being educado, which can mean either educated or well-mannered (the latter in this case). Ask a Mexican amigo if you’re invited to the party, and you’ll find yourself invited to the party–even if it was a family-only affair before. It’s just the polite thing to do.

In some instances, this avoidance of “no” leads to unusual outcomes. For instance, order a beer at a restaurant and if they find they are out of stock, they might not come back and tell you “no,” they might send someone down the street to the liquor store to buy that beer for you. In other cases, it’s just frustrating. We contacted a local smithy about a metal frame artwork we wanted done, and he told us yes he could do it, and then came out and took measurements. And then . . . crickets. No response, no estimate, nada. Maybe he was too busy, maybe it was too hard; we’ll never know, except we never heard “no.”

The one exception which proves the rule is Mexican bureaucracy, where “no” is a common response. As in “no, a color copy is not acceptable” or “no, you don’t have a full copy of your CFE bill including the pages that are nothing but advertising” or “no, the written amount on this check is hyphenated incorrectly.” The French may have invented bureaucracy (and remember, it was an improvement over previous forms of administration), but Mexico has made it its own. If bureaucracy was an Olympic sport, Mexico would always medal.

Sometimes “no” comes out as “yes.” Sometimes it comes out as a reluctant “yes.” Sometimes it comes out as “maybe later” or “maybe never.” But it rarely comes out as “no.” As an expat, you can get annoyed about it, just accept it, or embrace it as charmingly polite. But it won’t change.

Final judgment: Mexicans never say “no.” Mostly True.

Mexican Expat Myths #3: You are safe in Mexico

When a fellow American learns we live in Mexico, the first question is always the same: “Is it safe?” I want to sponsor a contest for the wittiest response because I am sooooooooooo tired of saying just “yes.” Some examples:

“No, but the cartel I work for has great fringe benefits.”
“Yes, as long as your chauffeur keeps his Uzi fully loaded.”
“No, but the FBI and I have a disagreement about firearms possession.”
“Yes, and that Wall is going to really cut down on illegal Americans!”

Feel free to add your own ideas in the comments.

All of which begs the question. Let’s look at some facts.

More Americans expats live (1.5 million) or visit as tourists (35 million before the pandemic) in Mexico than any other country on earth. More Americans die (238 in 2018) in Mexico every year than any other country on earth, and of those murdered, exactly half were killed in Mexico! Mexico’s murder rate (19 per 100,000) is roughly four times America’s. Oh, and there’s that little problem of drug cartel violence: have you heard about it? No, really, there are drug cartels running around with automatic weapons, armored vehicles and even rocket propelled grenades!

Now let’s look beyond the numbers. The total number of Americans who died in Mexico comprises roughly one-third homicides and two-thirds accidental deaths, which include large numbers of drownings and traffic accidents. The latter two types are fueled, literally, by the excessive drinking which characterizes American tourist behavior in Mexico. Let’s face it, the American ideal of a Mexican tourist vacation is a palapa on a sunny beach with unlimited drinks. This is not unique to Mexico, but because of the large numbers of Americans visiting, it drives up the absolute numbers of tourist deaths.

The homicide total for Americans in Mexico runs under one hundred annually, among 35 million tourists and 1.5 million expats. That comes out to .2 per 100,00 or the same murder rate as Japan, which has the lowest murder rate in the world. Many of those murder victims are dual (Mexican and American) nationals. Very few are expats. Some are tourists. How can a country with such a high rate of criminal violence and murder have so few American victims?

Most of the answer stems from the nature of cartel violence in Mexico. The vast majority of the violence is inter- or intra-cartel violence, followed closely by cartel violence against Mexico’s legal authorities. If you’re involved in the drug business, you (and even your family) are fair game. Same goes for the police and military fighting against the cartels. Yet all sides try to avoid killing the uninvolved; the cartels even go to great lengths (giving out aid during the pandemic, for example) to curry public favor. Which is not to say innocent people don’t get caught in the crossfire; they do. But most of the violence is targeted and people learn to avoid the places or activities which might get one in the cross-hairs. There have been two famous fatal attacks near the border that involved cartels mistakenly targeting a Mexican family (permanent US residents driving an American-plated car) and the infamous November 2019 slaughter of American Mormon expats. In both cases the vehicles were on deserted roads in cartel country and were mistaken for rival gangs, despite desperate attempts by the victims to explain who they were.

(Warning: Explicit lyrics) “it comes that way at least that’s what they say when you play the game”

Expats learn certain neighborhoods, certain streets, certain houses are places to avoid. There is a huge difference between crime in the tourist zones and nearby in the Mexican neighborhoods. You can find references to crimes in Cancun (the town) that have nothing to do with Cancun (the tourist zone). Tourists, drinking and looking for the next party in the wee hours of the morning, are more likely to stumble into a bad situation. But even then, only sixty-seven Americans were murdered in all of Mexico in 2018. That’s a bad week in Chicago.

The isthmus that looks like the number “7” is the tourist zone; the city of Cancun is at upper left.

And of that total, some were caught up in the drug business: remember, if you buy, sell, transport or visit places where drug transactions occur, you are part of the game. Cartels will still try to avoid killing gringos, but only because it’s bad for business, and it’s clear nobody (the cartels, the Mexican government, the American government, people in general) treats the numbers of incidental American deaths as a crisis.

To wrap it all up: stay (mostly) sober, don’t drive at night (because of cows, not cartels), don’t flash cash or jewelry, and avoid drugs and bad neighborhoods. Sounds like good advice for everywhere, no? Do this, and Mexico is about as dangerous as Japan (or Mayberry). Don’t do these things, and it gets marginally more dangerous, but still not very.

Final judgment: Expats (and tourists) are safe in Mexico: Mostly True.

America’s Race Problem

I seriously considered leaving this post empty. Just a title. An obscure existential point? Was it not really there? Was it a fragile white page? Would you infer what I was implying?

I also considered starting with a provocative quote, like:

But there is no neutrality in the racism struggle…One either allows racial inequities to persevere, as a racist, or confronts racial inequities, as an antiracist. There is not in between safe space of ‘not racist.’ The claim of ‘not racist’ neutrality is a mask for racism.
Ibram X. Kendi, “How to be an Antiracist”

But such language is the jargon of the activist, leaving no room for discussion, no way to exchange ideas. It is the language of exclusion, not reason. So let us reason together.

Contra Kendi, does America have a race problem? If so, what is it? And then what must be done?

First it pays to define the problem (always, says the engineer-by-training). If we ask “does America have a race problem?” we necessarily imply something unique. If everybody everywhere has a race problem (and they do), and America’s is the same as everywhere else’s, well then, there is nothing American to discuss. We could talk about racism in general, and why people instinctively distrust those who look differently. Let’s accept that as a fact (people do distrust “the other”) and let’s look at what may be unique about America.

America prides itself as a nation of immigrants. America calls itself a nation committed not to a race or creed, but to an idea: freedom. France sent the statue of Liberty Enlightening the World as a gift to America, in recognition of those self-evident truths we hold so dear: “. . . that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable (sic) rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

Yet America practiced slavery while enacting those words. It massacred Native Americans, abandoned freed slaves, derided Irish and Italian refugees, exploited Chinese laborers and imprisoned Japanese Americans. Certainly these facts alone make the case that America has a racism problem. Except every country and race has similar stories. The only unique thing here is the glaring discrepancy between actions and ideals.

To be uniquely American, the racism would need to have some distinct American characteristic. Not all these groups were immigrants, and other countries in the New World display similar discrimination between those who were here, those who came, and those who “mixed.” Mexico’s history is replete with struggles that can be directly tied back to Peninsulares (Spaniards born in España), Criollos (Spaniards born in Nueva España), Mestizos (of mixed race), and Ejidos (from the Mesoamerican peoples). Not all the groups subject to American racism were–to borrow an anachronism from today–people of color (although “Know Nothings,” the Proud Boys of their day, tried to paint the Irish and Italians as “white n-words”).

Run the tape of American history forward, and what do you find? The Irish and Italians consolidate and gain power. Latinos arrive in waves, either returning home with agricultural or economic seasons or assimilating as the second largest American ethnic minority group (although they are a disparate, heterogeneous group). Asian Americans are mirroring the patterns of the Latino population (and will eventually become the third largest ethnic group), only they are succeeding faster and in a more dramatic fashion. Elite academic institutions actively discriminate against various Asian Americans because–strictly relying on test scores–they would crowd out all other ethnic groups in the student body. Native Americans remain such a small contingent as to be statistical outliers: that they have not done well is obvious, but they’ve done better than some indigenous groups (try to find some Mexica, for example).

Which leaves African Americans. Their story, which we memorialize each February during African American History month, is unique in that they are the only such group brought to the land of freedom in chains. They are the only such group that had a governmental policy to free them (the Civil War and Reconstruction), yet they are also the only group abandoned by the same federal government (federal policy toward Native Americans never considered making them full members of American society, which was the initial goal of Reconstruction). These are historical facts.

These facts are often cited by the anti-racist, white fragility theories of Mr. Kendi and others. But do the facts support the theories and do the theories accurately describe the problem? If America is systematically racist to its core, why do millions of brown-skinned peoples quite literally march to the southern border begging to get in? They might have been excused for their ignorance once upon a time, but today, the internet has all the data they need. Why do thousands of Asians take a spot in administrative queues that may last years or decades? Why have three-quarters of the emigrants of Africa–since 1990–attempted to locate in America, where their black skin dooms them to second class status?

Something different, not systemic white racism, is going on here. If it was systemic and all-encompassing, a Jamaican-Indian couple would not have chosen to raise their daughter as “black” in 1960s Oakland, and we would not have our first black Vice President. Such a choice, and it was that by their own admission, would have been child abuse if it consigned her to a life of second-class status. In area after area where past practices of racism prohibited or limited African American participation, the elimination of those limits was followed by African American excellence: sports, music, media, law, medicine, politics and on and on.

Today, most African Americans are middle class or better. Most do not live in inner cities, but in suburbs and small cities. Most do not have a serious criminal record. They graduate high school at the same rate as the white majority. There are successful black-majority cities (Atlanta) and suburbs (Prince Georges county). There are black role models in every profession. What do these contra-indications mean? While in-depth studies of the black community demonstrate significant progress in the fifty years since 1968 riots, there are also data which point to lasting issues.

African american college graduation rates have lagged. Black unemployment recently improved but remains stubbornly high. One-third of African American males have felony convictions. Black household income, family wealth, and home ownership have only marginally improved (relative to whites) in fifty years. How to reconcile these competing data?

If you believe in critical race theory, you ignore positive developments, blame all negative outcomes on systemic racism, and draw a line in the sand called anti-racism. However, if as the anti-racists posit, America is racist to its core, and the entire system is rigged to protect fragile white egos, we never would have developed the America we have today. This does not mean racism is not a problem: racism is a problem everywhere, all the time. Let me repeat that: racism is a problem everywhere, all the time. But what confronts America is not the all-explaining, systemic racism imagined by anti-racists, but a much more specific challenge: the combination of a small black urban underclass and the soft racist policies that enable and prolong it.

When people imagine the plight of the American black community, what they envision is an urban wasteland with high rates of crime and violence, few jobs, poor housing and services, lousy schools, and no grocery stores. This description is no different from various ethnic minority ghettos of days gone by, and it remains accurate. Why has only this one persisted? There are two main reasons.

First, the racist limits on where blacks can live are devastating to the family, the community, housing prices, wealth accumulation, job and educational opportunities, health and victimization from crime. The solutions to this situation are not easy, but are well understood. The housing discrimination (redlining) which created and limited these communities has been carried on for decades under multiple mayoral and state government administrations. Why? It props up the property values of affluent city neighborhoods, keeps their schools segregated, and limits exposure to crime. This policy preference has persisted despite decades of Democratic Party control of major cities, and even despite the development of black-majority polities and local governments!

Which points to the second reason: a willingness among black and white activists to honor anti-social behaviors within the black community as some kind of legitimate, indigenous culture. The urban hellscape I described earlier was consistent across racial and ethnic groups, but previous inhabitants were forced to choose: abandon the anti-social behavior or be locked up or deported. Only the African-American community has been given a different alternative: stay in the slums and make a virtue out of the vices. Given the lack of opportunities (of all types), it is not surprising a number (remember, still a minority!) choose to remain mired. None of the anti-social behaviors were unique to black culture, nor did they stem from some mythic African past. Yet now they are celebrated.

There are overwhelming social science data on the negative effects of single-parent families, paternal absence, truancy, toleration of petty crime or exposure to drug use. One doesn’t have to criticize those struggling with these issues in recognizing what the data say. Add these factors in to the previous mix of poverty and hopelessness I described earlier and you have a toxic cultural brew. Affirm this toxic mess as a cultural inheritance and you have our current state of affairs.

Remember, it’s not that successful African Americans don’t face racial slights, indignities, and tangible torts: they absolutely do, every day. This remains a challenge we must all continue to face. Successful African Americans have the character to ignore them, the resources to avoid the provocations, or the access to legal or social remedies. But this is not the case for black urban underclass, and the problems there won’t be fixed with the same solutions.

I’ve touched on the solution before: a real effort to eliminate redlining’s legacy and to foster the growth and retention of a black middle class in the cities. Nowadays, the first thing a successful black family does is leave the city. Assisting them in becoming home-owners in the city’s affluent districts, or remaining in gentrifying neighborhoods, is a tangible and feasible policy. So is building affordable housing in those same areas and redeveloping the remaining areas. This in turn improves educational and professional prospects. But this would mean big-city mayors taking on the segregated, affluent power centers of their metropolises. Don’t hold your breath.

Even all this–by itself–won’t succeed. Work must also be done with leaders of the African American community to acknowledge those anti-social behaviors which have previously been tolerated or even celebrated. Past efforts in this vein have faltered as they were painted by activists as “blaming the victim,” which, in the absence of any other program to correct the problems, was true. However, no policy will succeed without addressing the self-harm the black community does. Strengthening the black nuclear family and addressing the problems associated with fatherlessness are key components. Again, where are the courageous leaders who will take this stand?

The over-emphasis on race embodied by the anti-racism movement and Critical Race Theorists defines the problem all wrong. When all you see is race, every issue becomes racism. Focusing on police violence is daft when only three percent of black murder victims are victims of police violence. Citing the greater effect of the coronavirus on African Americans is misguided when what we are seeing is not genetic, but the side effect of poverty and poor health care. Politicians and activists can take credit for meaningless gestures: changing school names while the school itself remains a shambles, or removing statues that are tributes to a history not even taught. And so the game goes on.

If you get the cause and effect wrong, you most certainly have defined the problem wrong.

And two wrongs still won’t make it right.

What Just Happened? Texas

Seeing the so-called news coverage about the blizzard and power outages in Texas, I wanted to do (another) post criticizing all the partisan hot-takes exploiting a natural disaster (also a man-made one, to boot!) to play politics. You know, those blaming “fragile green power” (the GOP), “Red States” (Democrats), or “unbridled capitalism” (Democratic Socialists), to name a few.

Instead, I decided to start another occasional series (What Just Happened, or perhaps WJH?) to give as straightforward as possible a review of some recent event. For the purposes of being as objective as possible, this will never be as instantaneous as a Tweet-storm, but it should be much more factual.

So what just happened in Texas? First and foremost, a snow and ice storm. Now Texans all know that the state gets snow and ice. Even a Yankee like me remembers a January 1st Dallas ice storm as the backdrop for the infamous Joe Montana “chicken soup” game when Notre Dame scored twenty-three points in the final eight minutes to beat the Houston Cougars in the 1979 Cotton Bowl.

A shameless lead-in to an Irish football story

So these storms are not normal, but are not rare. In fact, similar blizzards caused similar outages in 1989 and again in 2011.

Texans like to claim their state is unique, and when it comes to energy, they are right. Texas was the first big energy producing state, and to this day remains the largest US energy-producing state. Back in the 20th century, when electrification was all the rage, Texas was the first to build electricity-sharing networks. Texas looked at its own growth potential, the (then) weak energy potential of its neighbors, the federal government which claimed jurisdiction over interstate energy associations, and decided: we’ll go it alone! So all Texas (less San Antonio and parts of the Panhandle) is on its own, separate electricity network.

How did that work out? Pretty well; for the next seventy years, Texas had plenty of energy to fuel a building boom while enjoying some of the cheapest energy prices anywhere. Texas electricity rates are among the lowest in the nation. They averaged (before the blizzard) about 11 cents per kilowatt hour, although even residential users could find wholesale providers at rates as low as 5 cents per kilowatt hour! ((Note: wholesale providers are advising residential customers to immediately change providers, as now they are charging rates–high demand, low supply–that result in thousand dollar bills!)) Houston went from a small town to the 4th largest US city, and Houstonians could run their air conditioners all-day, most of the year, and pretend the city wasn’t built partially over a swamp.

After the 1965 East Coast blackout, Texas created the Electric Reliability Council of Texas or ERCOT. As the name implies, this non-profit was supposed to ensure Texans never faced a blackout. Over its history, ERCOT was relatively successful: Texas experienced major heat waves (when electricity consumption is at absolute peak) but never a heat-wave induced blackout. But Texas did experience blizzard-induced blackouts in 1989 and 2011. ERCOT was supposed to ensure lessons learned from 2011, along with the introduction of renewable sources (wind and solar) would prevent another blizzard blackout.

The problem in the summer is that electricity demand peaks. People (generally) keep their homes cool even when they’re not there, and of course the offices, stores and restaurants must keep cool too. The advantage is that hot weather generally does not affect electric power generation capacity. Some generative capacity can surge-on-demand (nuclear, natural gas, coal; wind and solar vary, but generally cannot be surged on demand). So the power authority surges to meet demand and there is no problem. Or, the power authority asks others in its network to share additional energy, and still no problem . . . except for Texas, which has no one else with whom to share.

Winter generally has less demand, so normally any increase in demand can be covered by surge, even in Texas. But, or should I say BUT, winter can affect those surge systems. Water pipes (at nuclear plants) or gas lines freeze. Tanker trucks get stuck. Wind turbines freeze. Snow covers solar panels (briefly) or falling snow blocks the sun. Meanwhile, people are stuck in their homes which may not be adequately insulated.

The New York Times created an excellent graphic (they had to ruin it with their explanatory article) showing day-by-day electrical power production under ERCOT:

Power production, by day, before and during the blizzard

You can clearly see several things:

Natural gas not only did not surge, it dropped significantly.
Coal, too experienced a small drop.
Even nuclear had a small drop due to one plant’s closure.
Wind dropped by the greatest percentage and slowly recovered (no, it didn’t cause the blackout).
Solar actually surged, although only in the daylight hours (duh).

Ever wonder why there was a system blackout when the graph shows some power being generated at all times? Power distribution systems are designed to run within tolerances. When demand greatly exceeds electric supply, surges happen which can result in component failures, fires, even explosions. Thus when things get really bad, it’s always better for the power authority to shut it down than risk having to replace costly, perhaps rare systems. That’s a worst case for which they’re prepared.

Several folks have voiced criticisms like “why did turbines freeze in Texas and not in Alaska?” or “why do solar panels work in space, but not Texas?” The second one is too stupid to be believed (it’s not the cold, it’s the snow; there is no snow in space). But the first hints at the problem: gas and water lines, turbines, and delivery vehicles can be winterized, and they were supposed to be. But they weren’t. We don’t know yet why.

Before we jump to the obvious conclusion, consider one more thing: the paradox of worst-case planning. How much do you spend preparing for the worst case? Texas experienced three outages, lasting less than two weeks total, over the last thirty-two years. In the meantime, the daily headline (for over eleven thousand days) was “Texas has the nation’s cheapest energy.” Winterization is cost effective, but not cheap. Any company which went ahead and did it was at a cost disadvantage to others in Texas as they passed along the costs to their customers. The same people attacking the Texas government had nothing but sympathy for Puerto Rico, where Prepa failed to plan for hurricanes which are far more frequent. The American federal government continues to subsidize the rebuilding of homes in flood plains rather than force homeowners to move in order to qualify. Sometimes government acts like a bad parent that lets the kids have candy before dinner.

What about the moral costs of failing to prepare? Twenty-two (at last count) Texans died due to the blizzard, millions were seriously affected, and some even needed to flee (that’s for you, Senator Cruz!). Yet in bluest of blue Illinois, where blizzards are an annual event, eleven people died due to the storm, and millions were affected, and so on. Blizzards kill people and destroy property for the same reason viruses spread: that’s what they do.

So what just happened in Texas? A rare but not unprecedented winter storm, perhaps a type becoming more common. A long-ago policy decision restricted options. The State government failed to confirm whether systems were winterized; we’ll know eventually whether they were mislead or incompetent. Networks proved (once again) to be more robust, although some engineers have pointed out the larger US western electrical network also experienced rolling blackouts, and if Texas had been attached to it, the entire system might have collapsed! Finally, preparation is less costly than recovery . . . if the worst case happens.

Oh, we can certainly confirm hindsight remains 20/20, and politics is always in play.

Mexican Expat Myths #2: You can not criticize the government

This is another oft-repeated saying among expats in Mexico, and yet it sounds odd. It usually comes amidst a heated online discussion, where one party scolds the other, “you can be deported if you criticize the (Mexican) government.” Such a bold statement certainly has an effect in chilling the conversation, but is it true?

You’ll find many expats who remember a case of someone who was deported for criticizing the government or engaging in politics. Or they heard from someone else of a case. But go and Google it for yourself, and it’s hard to find one. The closest I could find was a 2008 case in Merida of a young male expat who claimed he was avoiding a protest rally when Mexican authorities seized him and deported him for engaging in politics. The vast majority of American expats deported (there were only 750 Americans deported in 2020, and those numbers have been steady for decades) were longtime visa overstays (or people in Mexico with no visa at all).

All this goes back to the Mexican constitution. It said (Article IX) that, “Only Citizens of the Republic may take part in the political affairs of the country.” That is pretty plain in black & white. It went further (originally) in Article XXXIII which stated the President “shall have exclusive authority to expel from Mexico, immediately and without trial, any foreigner whose stay is deemed inconvenient.” Wow. That is as blanket a statement of the authority to deport as you’re likely to find!

It is easy to see how that absolute ban on politics and the blanket deportation language led many expats to assume you can’t criticize the government. But there is much more in the Mexican Constitution, and the issue is more nuanced than it would appear. Article I of the document gives all people, not just citizens, “. . . the human rights recognized in this Constitution and in those international treaties to which the Mexican State is a party, as well as the guarantees for their protection, whose exercise cannot be restricted nor suspended except in the cases and under the conditions established by this Constitution.” Article IX says, “The right to associate or unite peacefully for any licit objective cannot be stifled; but only those citizens of the Republic may take part in the country’s political matters.”A 2011 revision changed the President’s blanket authority thusly: “The Executive of the Union, after a hearing, may expel foreigners from the country on the basis of the law…”. Those additions changed the plenary authority of the President to exile an expat to something that must be adjudicated with due process.

Clearly the Mexican government has been liberalizing the rights of foreign residents, but one can see there remains a clear red-line: no political activity. Yet even this is murky. Some expats were appalled by the last American administration’s Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP, commonly called “Stay in Mexico”) which forced non-Mexican asylum seekers to await a hearing while remaining in Mexico. Expats spoke publicly against it. But the MPP was an agreement with the government in Mexico City, so the expat protestors were (wait for it) criticizing the position of the Mexican federal government! Yet they all still seem to be around.

So how to interpret all this? Engaging in political speech or action will likely offend someone and get you in trouble. This would include fund-raising, marching, promoting one or the other party: it doesn’t matter whether you are pro- or anti-administration, you might offend someone from another party who could report you. Discussing issues in general, talking with friends, even around a local, is highly unlikely to land you in trouble. Go online in social media sites and the odds get worse, since now there is a record (to be misconstrued, possibly) and you don’t control who sees it. Make yourself a general nuisance to the host nation by leading marches and starting movements, publishing tracts and proposing policies? More likely still: Adios, muchachos! In the end, there are very few recorded cases of expats being deported for engaging in political activity; more often it’s a case of immigration fraud. So have your paperwork in order, and don’t sweat it.

Final judgment: Expats can not criticize the government; Partially True.

Mexican Expat Myths #1: You can not have a gun in Mexico

You’ll hear this common wisdom all the time among expats, sometimes with the added sarcasm of “this isn’t the United States” or “please don’t come here, you gun nut.” Those are the cleaned up versions. Questions about guns seem to bring out the worst in judgmentalism among some expats, but what’s the law say?

Mexico’s constitution (Article X), like its northern and southern neighbors, specifically protects the right to keep a firearm in one’s residence for the purpose of self-protection. This right extends to citizens and legal permanent residents (such as expats). There are many further restrictions, on the size of the weapon, the types of ammunition, permits to carry or hunt with it, buy or sell one. This web of restrictions is what leads expats to believe you can’t have a gun in Mexico, but it’s not quite true.

Part of the confusion about guns is that Mexico’s firearm laws are federal ones, applying across the entire country, while America has some federal rules and a patchwork of state and local regulations that vary between practically denying the constitutional right to promoting mandatory gun ownership (see Kennesaw, Georgia). In Mexico, there is only one set of rules and little tolerance, unless you’re a cartel.

There is only one legal weapon shop in Mexico, near Mexico City, and it is run by SEDENA, the Mexican Department of Defense. You can pre-apply for a permit to bring a weapon into Mexico, but the weapon must meet all the requirements mentioned above and then be carefully brought across the border with much paperwork. As always when laws, paperwork, and border guards are involved, there is a lot of room for miscommunication, corruption, and trouble. Americans who accidentally show up at the border with weapons or ammunition (like they do everyday at US airports) find themselves immediately incarcerated and the subject of diplomatic negotiations.

Why is Mexico so tough on weapons? For one thing, there is that long history of revolutions in which firearms play a significant role. Lately there is the raft of narcotics-related cartel violence. While many weapons confiscated can be traced back to the United States, many thousands more come from the vast quantities of AK-47s (the weapon of choice) that remain available throughout Central America, left over from the various Soviet-sponsored revolutionary movements there. Suffice it to say that the Mexican government feels about weapons trafficked from the United States the same way the US feels about drugs coming from Mexico.

Cue Glenn Frey: “the politics of contraband, the smuggler’s blues.”

So, yes, you can have a gun as a legal permanent resident, but many types of guns are prohibited, there are further limits on numbers, you have to pre-apply to bring one, you have to go through a paperwork hassle to buy one, there are permits for transporting (with significant costs), and your chance of being approved for carrying the weapon (outside your home) are negligble. One can see how some expats, comparing gun ownership here to the States or in Canada, opine “you can’t have one.”

Finally, that right to defense of one’s self at home in Mexico got strengthened in 2018. The changes made it permissible to hit, injure, or even kill any intruder (armed or not) in one’s home, and forbid criminal prosecution of the home defender in such cases. But note this new law, like “castle doctrine” laws elsewhere, has to be interpreted, so don’t accept it as carte blanche.

The larger question is “why would you need a gun?” In the States, this is an incendiary question, because one doesn’t require a reason to exert a constitutional right: “just cause I want to” is perfectly fine. This is clearly not the case in Mexico, where the constitutional right is hemmed in in ways that resemble “why?” For lakeside residents, it’s easy to explain why not. I didn’t own weapons in the States, but I did support the 2nd Amendment. I know expats here who did own weapons in the States, but don’t here (neither do I). Why not? No threat to justify it. Violent crime here locally is minimal, and even less so for expats (another myth I’ll address later).

Final disclaimer: I’m not a lawyer, and I didn’t stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night. If you are thinking of bringing a weapon to Mexico, or buying one here for self-defense, contact a lawyer who can walk you through all the angles. If there is one thing I have learned in Mexico, it is this: there is the law, and there is what happens; the two don’t necessarily coincide.

Final judgment: Expats can not have a gun; mostly false.

Attention to (Executive) Orders

President Biden has been on a tear these past two weeks, daily signing executive orders to a running total of twenty-five. What are these things, and what do they mean? As the name implies, an Executive Order (or Executive Action, the name sometimes changes) is just an order issued by the President as Chief Executive. It has the force of law within the Executive branch, meaning when I worked for the federal government, I could have been fired, fined, or jailed for violating one. But it is not a law, which requires the passage of Congress and signature of the President (as Bill from Schoolhouse Rock taught us):

Executive orders go right back to President Washington, and recent Presidents aren’t even in top ten when it comes to numbers: Teddy Roosevelt cranked out over one thousand, as did Woodrow Wilson and Calvin Coolidge; FDR spouted over three thousand, and set the record for average per year, too! Recent Presidents (starting with Clinton) started returning to executive orders as it became increasingly impossible to get any agreement on new laws in the Congress. Like a law, an executive order can be reviewed by the courts and deemed illegal or unconstitutional. When an executive order conflicts with a law, the law wins. Finally, an executive order can be rescinded by the President or his successor at will.

Some of the best and worst policies in US history came about as executive orders. FDR used EOs for many of his New Deal policies, but he also imprisoned Japanese Americans with one. Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation was an executive order, but so was his policy to deny habeas corpus in Maryland. Truman desegregated the US military with one, but he tried–and failed–to seize the nation’s steel mills with one, too! Woodrow Wilson found time to issue an executive order covering the use of torches for hunting in the Panama Canal Zone, and Herbert Hoover went all meta by issuing an executive order on the issuance of (wait for it) executive orders.

So are these EOs, as they’re called, important? Maybe, maybe not. Consider some examples. The President can use an EO to adjust how the federal government enforces a law. Take immigration. According to law, people inside the United States illegally are to be deported after due process. Each President can issue an EO indicating what emphasis should be placed on which groups: for example, President Obama directed (via EO) deportation be focused on violent criminals, in effect (since there are only so many immigration officers and courts) allowing many people eligible for deportation to stay in the United States. This was a very significant executive order, with very real effects on average people.

Executive orders can also be symbolic. President Trump’s “Muslim ban” (a pejorative I’ll use just as shorthand) was an Executive Order reviewed by the Supreme Court and found constitutional, primarily because the actual EO highlighted the fact that all the countries included either failed to provide–or did not have–data on their citizens for the US to consider for visa purposes. President Biden faced a dilemma: if he simply rescinded it, he would be permitting visa applications which could not be verified. So his new EO rescinds the broad policy put forward by President Trump, but retains a review of its information sharing requirements, which will likely have the same effect. Visa applicants from the countries previously banned are still going to have to provide positive proof they are not suspect in any way–a thing very hard to do.

Executive orders may cause more confusion than execution. President Biden rescinded all of President Trump’s immigration-related EOs. Except no immigration is currently permitted due to the pandemic, so no one can come anyway. But his administration telegraphed the changes before the inauguration, so now thousands of asylum-seekers are headed to the border. That, and Mexico is not very happy with the new administration, so they changed their laws (partially) to prevent the US from returning non-Mexican families across the border. So now the CDC says no one can cross, the Mexican government says no one can cross back, and the border patrol has been told what not to do (family separations). Result: migrants are walking across the border and being quarantined then released in the United States to await further processing in already overwhelmed immigration courts. Tricky business, what?

At times it is unclear what effect an EO will have. President Biden enacted a mask wearing requirement for all forms of public transportation. So if you take a bus or train, or go an airport, you too have to wear a mask. Of course, most of these locations already had a Departmental, Agency, or local requirement for masks. But now the EO means that if a federal employee (say, a National Park Service Ranger) lets you go maskless, they can be fired. And that bus driver (not a federal employee) must not let you board without a mask. Do they refuse to move the bus? Call police? Throw you off? All this remains to be worked out. I trust most people will just wear masks, but there have been several incidents on airplanes, so who knows?

It is a shame that there is so little bipartisanship in Washington that Congress can’t pass laws, so Presidents rely on possibly ephemeral executive orders. It is worse in my opinion that the media does such a poor job of explaining what the orders do or don’t do, instead characterizing them by numbers or failing to note the complexities altogether. This has and will only lead to more public distrust, when the policy outcomes don’t match the rhetoric. President Trump had a number of executive orders on “buying American” and now President Biden has one, too. Did any smart media source point out that United States treaties have the force of US law, so commitments made therein trump these orders? Did you know that any federal procurement over $182,000 USD (a paltry sum to the federal government) must be open to bids from twenty US allies under the Government Procurement Act? But it sounds good, no?

Executive orders appear to be a policy option which will be around for the near future. They can sound grand and be meaningless, or sound harmless and be far-reaching. They are simply a tool, and with all tools, over-reliance is a problem. As we used to say in the Army, if your only tool is an M1A1 tank, every problem looks like a target.

Pay Back time

No, no, not the “payback is a . . .” type. The good kind!

We’ve benefited from numerous suggestions about things to watch while on lock-down . . . again. I thought I would pass along what we watched, what we liked and disliked, in case anybody else is in a similar need.

Judy & I basically stopped watching network TV in the late 90’s. Seinfeld lurched to an exhausted, silly ending (in my opinion), which was an apt metaphor for most major network fare. Friends kept suggesting “edgy” shows on cable, but they seemed mostly gimmicks. Sex scenes replaced good writing, token characters (“look, the first x on network TV”) replaced depth. I knew there had to be good television out there, but I was unwilling to wade through the dreck to find it.

Hunkered down today with satellite TV and decent Internet speeds, we had literally decades of material available, and more important, the longer vista of critical reviews (and friends) to guide us.

We enjoyed The Sopranos, which held to high production standards across six seasons. The characters were interesting, if not always likable. You could make a very entertaining drinking game by taking a shot every time an episode shows a completely unnecessary scene set in the strip bar. One could almost here the producer saying,”hey, this is cable, dammit, get the naked dancers in here.” And no, I didn’t really like the en . . . . .

Likewise, The Wire was excellent for five seasons. We really enjoyed seeing actors we liked in later series, here in their first breakthrough roles. This series got so many plaudits for its gritty realism, and they were well-deserved. What kept bothering me was: how could so many people watch a show like this and NOT begin to understand the problems of urban crime and race? It’s all there literally in black and white.

Breaking Bad was a guilty pleasure: such well-crafted plot-lines and characters. Sadly, it completed a transition I noticed at the time, from cheering for good (if flawed) characters to asking us to cheer for despicable ones. Judy & I began debating whether there were ANY identifiably “good” characters in the series, and as the five seasons unfolded, we both concluded “none.” The sequel movie El Camino and prequel series Better Call Saul are just as good, and “bad.”

On a lighter note, the recently concluded Schitt’s Creek was a joy to watch. The Canadian production (eighty episodes, but only twenty-plus minutes per) proved the sitcom is not dead, it just requires writers. Now, this is not earth-shattering television: the story line is basically Green Acres with a side story of a gay couple. But it marked the return of very flawed characters who (mostly) evolve in positive ways. And it’s funny, even if just for the facial expressions of Eugene & Dan Levy (Father & son). Bonuses: No laugh track, no gratuitous sex.

Another favorite was the Starz/BBC dramatic miniseries The Spanish Princess about Catherine of Aragon. We stumbled onto this one before realizing it was third in a series, so we need to double back to the The White Queen and The White Princess. Together they tell the tale of the various powerful women involved with the English War of the Roses and subsequent reign of Henry VIII. There are some historical liberties taken: no, Catherine did not ride into battle in maternity armor (she elsewhere and at a different time gave a rallying speech to the troops wearing such armor), but the discrepancies are only minor and the stories remain solid.

The only thing we gave up on so far was Ozark, which seemed to take the same general theme as Breaking Bad and the production quality of The Sopranos. Every character was despicable from the get-go, and the plot contrives early on to get into the strip club business, because, “hey, get the naked dancers in here!” Sorry, derivatives need not apply.

Turning to movies, here are a few lesser known treats:

Find the full length director’s cut of Apocalypse Now and watch it. But first, do me a small favor. Find a copy (or free PDF) of Joseph Conrad’s novella Heart of Darkness, the book upon which the Coppola movie is based. It’s short, and you probably were forced to read it in high school or college and quickly forgot it. But the movie is not about Vietnam, it’s about the issues raised in Conrad’s book: myths about civilized and uncivilized peoples, the confusion of technology and progress, misguided loyalties and the depths a person can sink to when they become unmoored. The movie has about a hundred unforgettable quotes, and of course, this scene:

“Someday this war is gonna end . . . “

Since you have time, how about watching some trilogies as collective stories?

I suggest you begin with the Dollars Trilogy, the three Spaghetti Westerns directed by Sergio Leone and starring Clint Eastwood. Leone didn’t intend that A Fistful of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More, and The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly be a trilogy. But Eastwood’s iconic “Man with No Name” is unchanged throughout, bringing the movies together.

Next, an actual trilogy done by Sergio Leone, the “Once Upon a Time” series. These stories capture the essence of different periods and places. Caution: make sure you get the full original versions of these movies. They were initially released in the States with severe editing that made them practically unwatchable! Once Upon a Time in the West covers the mythology of the American Western Frontier, Duck! You Sucker (the real title) covers the Mexican Revolution, and Once Upon a Time in America is the story of Jewish Gangsters in New York City. All very different, and very compelling.

Finally, a really off-the-wall trilogy: the El Mariachi series (by Robert Rodriguez), also called the Desperado series or simply the Mexico series. It comprises El Mariachi, Desperado, and Once Upon a Time in Mexico (an homage to Leone’s work). These are modern Westerns, love stories full of tragic mistakes, revenge, and surreal violence. The first was practically a home movie, but proved so interesting it sparked a sequel that brought Antonio Banderas in for the lead with Salma Hayek as his love interest. Steve Buscemi, Cheech Marin, and Quentin Tarantino have bit parts (Google “Tarantino’s joke scene in Desperado”. This is a family-friendly blog or I would link to it!). The finale adds in Johnny Depp (as a CIA ‘agent’), Eva Mendes, and Danny Trejo. While it has a meandering plot, it is still good fun and you’ll never look at puerco pibil the same way again!

If you have a favorite series or movie that might deserve another look, or might have been overlooked, please mention it in the comments!